Chapter 18
1555 Words
The distant, mournful wail of a siren pulled Chloe from a sleep that had felt less like rest and more like a heavy, drug-induced coma. Her eyes snapped open, the ceiling of the motel room—stained with water damage and peeling paint—coming into sharp focus. For a heartbeat, she forgot where she was, but the weight of the gold coin in her pocket and the cool, unmoving presence beside her brought the nightmare rushing back.
Cassius lay perfectly still on the adjacent bed. In the dim morning light filtering through the cracks in the boarded-up window, he looked like a funeral effigy carved from marble. He didn't breathe; he didn't twitch. To anyone else, he would have looked dead, but Chloe could sense the humming power beneath his skin, a resonance that seemed to vibrate in her own marrow.
She sat up, her head swimming. She did the math, her nurse’s brain struggling through the haze. He had given her his blood yesterday at high noon. It had been roughly eighteen hours. That meant she had thirty hours left of this heightened, volatile state—thirty hours where her body was a biological engine running on supernatural fuel.
The sirens grew louder, then faded, likely heading toward the diner where she’d made such a spectacle of herself.
"Cassius," she whispered.
He didn't move, but his eyes opened instantly—dark and alert. "The metal hounds are near."
"They're looking for us. We have to move, but..." Chloe paused, a wave of intense physical discomfort washing over her.
It wasn't just the hunger this time, though the burger from the night before felt like a distant memory. It was the crushing weight of her own humanity asserting itself. She felt... revolting. Her hair was matted with dried salt, grease, and dirt from the pier. Her skin felt tacky with sweat and the residue of adrenaline. They hadn't bathed in over forty-eight hours, and the smell of the motel room—damp and neglected—was only making her feel more nauseous.
But then, she felt a sharp, familiar cramp deep in her abdomen. A hot, heavy sensation followed.
No. Not now, she thought, her face flushing a deep, embarrassed red.
She was a nurse. She dealt with bodily fluids every day. She understood the mechanics of the human body better than anyone, but the timing was catastrophic. Between the flight from the hunters and the vampire blood in her veins, her cycle had decided to arrive with a vengeance.
She stood up quickly, clutching her stomach. "I... I need the bathroom."
Cassius sat up, his movements as fluid as shadow. He watched her with an intensity that made her want to crawl into a hole. To him, every shift in her scent, every micro-expression, was a book to be read.
"Thou art pained," he said, standing and closing the distance between them in a single, silent step. "The wound from the woods? Did the briars cut thee deeper than I saw?"
"No! No, I'm fine," Chloe said, her voice rising an octave. She backed toward the cramped, yellowed bathroom. "I just... I need to clean up. We both do. We smell like the harbor and... and death."
She shut the door and leaned against it, her heart racing. The bathroom was a disaster—the shower curtain was moldy, and the tiles were chipped—but it had a functional sink and a shower. She stripped off her ruined jeans and winced. It was a mess.
She looked at the small, complimentary bar of soap on the counter and the two thin, scratchy towels. She had nothing. No supplies, no change of clothes, nothing but the blood-stained scrubs she was wearing as a base layer.
She turned on the water, letting the pipes groan and clank until a lukewarm stream began to hiss from the rusted showerhead. She scrubbed her skin until it was raw, trying to wash away the memory of the pier and the scavenger. But the embarrassment was a physical weight. How was she supposed to explain this to a man from the 1300s? How was she supposed to travel across the country like this?
Outside the door, she heard the floorboards creak.
"Chloe?" Cassius’s voice was right against the wood. "The air... it has changed. I smell... blood. Fresh blood."
Chloe squeezed her eyes shut, her face burning. "Cassius, please. Just stay out there."
"Art thou bleeding? Did the hunters strike thee with a hidden bolt?" His voice was rising with that protective, sharp edge. To him, the scent of her blood was a flare in the dark.
"It's not a wound!" she shouted, her voice muffled by the sound of the water. "It's just... a girl thing. A human thing. I’m fine!"
There was a long silence. In the 14th century, Cassius had known women—he had been a husband. But the medieval understanding of biology was wrapped in superstition and silence. He stood on the other side of the door, his hand hovering over the handle, his instincts screaming at him that his charge was losing life-force, while his mind struggled to categorize the nature of it.
"I do not understand," he murmured through the door. "If thou art bleeding, let me mend it. My blood can—"
"No more blood!" Chloe cried, leaning her head against the cold tile. "Please, just let me be human for ten minutes. I just need... I need to find a pharmacy. Or a store."
She finished her makeshift shower, drying herself with the thin towel. She felt slightly better, but the lack of supplies made her feel incredibly vulnerable. She put her dirty clothes back on—there was no other choice—and stepped out, refusing to meet his eyes.
Cassius was standing by the window, his hood up. He looked at her, his gaze lingering on the paleness of her face and the way she was holding her arm across her stomach.
"Thou art a mystery of the earth, Chloe," he said softly.
"I'm just a woman, Cassius," she sighed, her anger replaced by a weary sadness. "And right now, being a woman is really, really hard."
He reached out, his cool hand catching hers. He didn't ask again. He simply felt the heat of her skin and the frantic pulse in her wrist. "Then we shall find what thou needest. The world of man is filled with 'stores' of plenty. I shall fetch the supplies while thou hidest."
"You can't go to a*****e! You don't even know how to use a self-checkout, and you look like you’re about to join a cult," Chloe said, a small, tired laugh escaping her.
"I have the gold," he said, touching the pocket where he knew the coin was. "And I have the shadow. I will not have thee suffer in silence."
He moved toward the bathroom, his own need for the water finally outweighing his paranoia. He stripped off the stolen hoodie, revealing a chest that was a map of old scars and new, half-healed bruises. Chloe turned away, her face heating up again, but not before she saw the raw power in his frame.
While the water ran for him, Chloe sat on the bed, clutching a pillow to her stomach. She looked at her phone—the broken pieces she’d thrown in the tunnel were long gone, but she felt the phantom weight of it. She was disconnected from everything. Sarah, her job, her home.
She looked at the bathroom door. She was tied to a man who didn't understand the 21st century, whose blood was currently making her eyes glow in the dark, and who thought every scratch was a mortal wound.
But as she heard the water stop and the door creak open, she realized she didn't want to be anywhere else. The fear was still there, but the loneliness was gone.
"We leave in five minutes," Cassius said, stepping out. He looked cleaner, his dark hair damp and pushed back, revealing the sharp, aristocratic lines of his face. "We go north. I saw a map in the 'office' of this place. There is a path through the mountains."
"And the store?" Chloe asked.
"On the way," he promised. "I shall be thy shadow, Chloe of the Blue. Even in this... 'girl thing'."
Chloe buried her face in her hands. "Please never say that again."
"As thou wishest," he said, a faint, ghost of a smile touching his lips.
But the moment of levity was shattered. Outside, the sound of a helicopter began to thump-thump-thump over the woods, the searchlight sweeping across the motel’s rusted roof. Beatrice wasn't just following the sirens; she was narrowing the grid.
"Go," Cassius hissed, grabbing his hoodie.
They slipped out the back, moving into the dense, morning fog. Chloe’s stomach cramped again, a reminder of her humanity, while her heart pounded with the strength of a monster. She had thirty hours left. And the world was already screaming for her blood.
- Writer
